Tag: Human Trafficking

Human trafficking, like domestic violence, is about power and control. It occurs when one person compels or coerces another to engage in forced labor or paid sex work. For some survivors, human trafficking and domestic violence can be overlapping experiences.

Trafficking and domestic violence can overlap

Traffickers can be married to or in an intimate relationship with the people they traffic. In some cases, the trafficker begins the relationship under false pretenses explicitly to exploit their partner, most often sexually. Other relationships may devolve into human trafficking and domestic violence over time. Traffickers use tactics like other abusive partners to control their partner, including isolation, emotional abuse, sexual abuse and exploration, financial abuse, threatening family, physical abuse, and withholding food, transportation, or immigration paperwork. Sex traffickers may intentionally impregnate their partners so they can use the threat of separation or violence as another form of control. Immigrant survivors may face additional threats because of the language barrier, immigration status, and fear of deportation.